‘And then, one fine day, I met a man in a big restaurant on Kurfürstendamm (needless to say, I only ate at the finest restaurants). I realised immediately that he was the very person I had been waiting for. A man in his prime, from an ancient line of fabulously wealthy aristocrats, with vast estates in Westphalia. He spent his winters in Berlin, in his villa, with his only daughter, who was eighteen years old. He had no wife but, on the contrary, was attracted to members of his own sex — a fact that I registered at once. I decided to take advantage of this inclination; I was far from ugly, if I say so myself, tastefully dressed, and charming. I saw immediately that he had taken a fancy to me. I told him neither my real name nor the name I had adopted in Berlin. For him I produced a brand-new name and an invented address to go with it. At first we met two or three times in the same restaurant, and he showed himself far from mean. He invited me to cafés and wine cellars, gave me a diamond ring, and even took me to the theatre, where he introduced me to his daughter as “my young friend von Mirten”. I did not, apparently, succeed in making a very good impression on the daughter, who treated me disdainfully, looked down on me from a vast height, and did not deign to exchange a single word with me. I did not take her behaviour to heart, however, and pretended not to notice. All I cared about at that moment was the fact that I had the old man in my pocket — the rest would come of its own accord. I had my plan of action ready. At any rate, he had not yet made me an indecent proposal; he was probably waiting for the relationship to ripen. After the evening at the theatre, I accompanied him home in a hansom cab, and he invited me to dine there with him the next day. The following evening — there were five other dinner guests besides myself: an old couple with their daughter, his daughter’s friend, and a young man — I noted the entrances and exits to the house and decided to carry out my plan two nights later, when my hosts were invited to spend the evening with the old couple and their daughter.